Code Lyoko: Lyokostar 1: Story 2: Surprises and Secrets
by WindySilver
Summary: Mary is dead. Or is she? If a fake death is not counted, then not! She is behind the scenes, in the shadows, again, watches out for X.A.N.A. and waits for a new chance to make her new return. Can she succeed when she is up against not just X.A.N.A.'s army with XanaWilliam as its general but also the Lyoko Warriors' unwavering belief on the veracity of her death?
1. Part 1: Alone

Mary was in Skidbladnir's garage. She thought about what she could do. X.A.N.A. had found out that she had fooled it, so now all of its gang was chasing her. Mary walked back and forth while wondering what she had to do. However, nothing came to her mind and thus she sighed, slumping to sit on the ground. Mary sighed again.

"William is under X.A.N.A.'s control, my friends think that I'm dead and when I try to contact them, they think I'm a X.A.N.A.'s specter and to boot, monsters, William and X.A.N.A. are chasing me. It feels... like I'm... abandoned, forgotten, redundant, useless... It feels like it doesn't matter if I exist... I've been abandoned, the whole world has abandoned me. Yeah, that's how it is," Mary, sad and depressed, told herself and Skidbladnir's dock – which, of course, did not listen and could not care less about the girl's heartache.

After saying that Mary started to cry because the old memories came back to her mind in the unbroken silence. The good old times felt very distant and that they were; it had been 10 years from all that.

While thinking about it all Mary remembered that unless her sense of time had failed, on that very day she turned 15. It did not help, though. The world had abandoned her maybe even for good, the friends at least had. The birthday had been nothing to her for ten years since no one celebrated it. She was celebrating there all alone but without anyone with her the meaning of the birthday had disappeared. She could barely even remember what a birthday truly was and what it meant, not to mention the date.

Taken over by sorrow, Mary did not notice the arrival of the very person whose coming she had feared for all week, not to mention the past times. It seemed that after defying death for years, doom would take her now that her morale was gone whereas XanaWilliam was more serious than ever before. The Xana Warrior noticed that it was the best time to attack as the target did not notice anything, so he took his sword and went towards the girl.

Inside his mind from which the vexation about the girl's believed but faked death had been strictly wiped away, he already regarded this as a victory.

Now he would get his final victory on the dragon girl.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	2. Part 2: Rollback

Mary heard someone approaching and turned her gaze, seeing her arch enemy coming. She saw her doom coming yet she did not get up to her battle stance. She no longer cared if she existed or did not. Without friends, without hope, without _anything_ she no longer had enough strength to fight a fight she now felt to be doomed to lose.

"Go ahead! Destroy me! I won't stop you any longer! The whole world has abandoned me, so it doesn't matter where I am anymore! It doesn't matter if I do exist or not anymore!" Mary said with a shaking but determinate voice. She was certain about her decision; she could not stand it anymore. This was hopeless, was it not?

William became confused because Mary had always fought for her life no matter what happened. She had fought even against her friend when the only other option was destruction! What on Earth had happened?

"How on Lyoko have you got that attitude? You've always fought for your life with all means available!" William asked, astounded.

"My friends have abandoned me because they think I'm dead. And when I try to contact them, they think I'm a specter! Even on Lyoko! My life has no meaning anymore!" Mary said and started to cry again. XanaWilliam was completely confused. He did not comprehend how Mary had suddenly started to act like that; after all, the girl had escaped him for already a week. The Xana Warrior no longer knew what to do. Even the head, X.A.N.A., was just as confused, which caused XanaWilliam to stay put without an order.

That was when Mary noticed that X.A.N.A.'s grip on William started to loosen. It awakened a small glimpse of hope in her. Could she still do something to change the situation? Was saving William still possible?

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. She would die anyway even if she did nothing. She could die trying to save her childhood friend from X.A.N.A.'s clutches as well. Therefore, she thought up a plan and decided to lure William to the tower which held the protected calculations for the program which was meant to free him. On her way there she would think about her moves better. She stood up and pointed at the wall behind William.

"What's that?" she asked, seeming suddenly panicky. William turned, and Mary used her wings to rise up from the garage. Outside the girl shouted down, "Never believe everything that the enemy says!"

Then she left. William got angry, of course, called his black Manta and started the chase. Mary opened the tunnel to Ice Sector, looked behind her and left, knowing that William chased after her. Occasionally Mary turned to fly backwards and shouted hoots at her chaser. This, of course, made William more and more angry.

Soon Mary found the tower was looking for and flew straight into it. She did not have much time to combine the calculations, download them into a fireball and prepare to act. However, William was faster than Mary expected, and the girl tried to keep him a sword's length away with her fireballs until the download would be ready.

"Come on, hurry up now," Mary mumbled through the teeth she had clamped together. The download was almost ready and William was almost close enough to hit the very last strike.

"Hurry up, hurry up!" Mary growled. Then the download was ready and a greenish fireball appeared into her hand.

William backed off, alert. He realized that Mary was plotting something and threw her out of the tower. The girl protected her precious fireball and got up to wait for William. He came out and Mary closed her eyes, prayed in her mind that it would work and then threw the fireball at William after opening her eyes. The Xana Warrior did not have time to dodge and a blinding white-hot shockwave knocked them both unconscious to the ground.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	3. Part 3: Revealing The Truth

Jeremy looked at the map and saw Mary and William's familiar icons close to the tower which held the calculations. According to the supercomputer, something had happened and the duo was now unconscious. Jeremy called the others and told them to come right away. An obvious trap or not, the case had to be inspected immediately.

Mary rose, groaning. The hit had been hard. William was waking up slowly as well. However, the brain activity started slowly in Mary and she did not realize that she should watch out for the Lyoko Warriors who came there, weapons raised and ready to stop the duo right there.

"Hey! What are the two of you doing here?" Ulrich asked and walked closer to them, pointing his swords at both of them. The others stayed behind, ranged weapons ready to attack. Mary looked at William; X.A.N.A.'s marks had disappeared from him.

"Well he doesn't know what has already happened," Mary said, nodding towards William, "but it seems I stitched together the right calculations and used them where they were supposed to be used."

"What?" Ulrich asked, confused. "Jeremy?"

"According to the supercomputer, the tower's calculations were loaded into a fireball in a certain composition. And no notifications about a bug or anything else irrelevant have come," Jeremy notified, scratching his head.

"Umm... Hello, everyone. Err... What happened? And where are we?" William stammered. He did not comprehend what was going on.

"What's the last thing you remember, William?" Yumi asked with a neutral tone.

"The last thing I remember... Wait a sec... I was in my room... and some weird shadow was moving there. It attacked me all of a sudden," William reminisced. "Then nothing."

"So, on the other words, about two months under Xanafication," Aelita said. "He does seem to be free from X.A.N.A.'s possession."

"It could be a trap again," Ulrich remarked and pointed William attentively with his sword.

"Thanks for the confidence," Mary muttered. Ulrich glared at her and turned his other sword back towards her.

"What? I just said," she noted innocently and raised her hands. Ulrich turned his regard back to William. _William does seem to be free from X.A.N.A.'s control for real,_ he mused.

"Well, what do we do? Shall we materialize William and return the clone from his duty?" Odd asked.

"I second," Yumi said. She was fed up with the clone, she had been ever before its latest arrival.

"I second," Aelita announced.

"I do as well," Mary and Jeremy said concurrently. The others looked at Mary, surprised, as she had not been expected to join their vote. Mary ignored it and looked at William. Would he recognize her?

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	4. Part 4: Conflict

The Superscanner alerted; X.A.N.A. had activated the tower of Sector 5.

"Whatever. X.A.N.A. isn't pleased; the tower of Sector 5 is active. Go there, I'll send you the vehicles," Jeremy reported.

"Roger, Jeremy," Aelita acknowledged as the vehicles appeared.

"William, come aboard! It'll be fun for sure!" Odd said.

"Okay..." William replied, although doubting the fun of the ride as he saw Odd jump onto the Overboard. Mary opened her wings while Aelita jumped to ride with Yumi.

"Did we really invite you to come with us?" Yumi asked Mary, frowning.

"No, but I'll come anyway. This is my fight too," Mary answered. "If you don't want my help, then I'll work solo; I'll work as your shadow and help as I deem the best."

William looked at her. He knew that there was something very familiar in Mary. Something he had to remember but which he still had forgotten a long time ago.

"We're at the end of the sector, Jeremy. Will you call a taxi?" Yumi asked after going a shortish travel.

"Absolutely! Scipio!" Jeremy answered and typed a familiar code for the first time in a long time. The Transporter came and picked the Lyoko Warriors up.

"Here again. It's been some time," William said, looking around. The Arena did not seem to have changed at all since the day he had been virtualized there for the first time.

"Uh-oh, it seems X.A.N.A. has restored its key system. You have two minutes," Jeremy said.

"Wonderful. I did miss the good old busy going!" Odd shouted. The corridor opened.

"Let's go!" Aelita said, and so they set off to face X.A.N.A.'s new schemes.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	5. Part 5: At Sector 5 Again

"Well then, where's the key?" Mary asked.

"Isn't it that one over there?" Yumi asked and pointed at the farthest corner of the room. Creepers crawled from the holes of the walls of that corner, confirming her suspicion.

"Those monsters... Those were here when I was here for the first time," William noted.

"They are always here," Mary blurted and threw her first fireballs.

"Let's go! Laser arrows!" Odd shouted and started shooting.

"Don't forget the key! You have only a minute!" Jeremy reminded.

"I'll take care of that. Super Sprint!" Ulrich announced and dashed towards the key, protecting himself with his swords.

Pieces of the ceiling crashed down! Ulrich cried out and barely managed to dodge them. The Creepers were not as lucky.

"Ten seconds! Hurry up, Ulrich!" Jeremy shouted.

"I'm doing my best, Jeremy!" Ulrich shouted. He ran over a fallen piece and smashed the key to the end by force. Jeremy sighed in relief; the countdown stopped at the last tenth of the last second. Yumi's fan destroyed the Creeper which had creeped behind Ulrich.

They kept going, Mary in the front. William, who carried his now reformed sword, stayed in the rear of the group. He did not feel that he belonged to the group nor the defiance-like morale, which seemed to nearly radiate from Mary, inside himself. Mary, on the other hand, felt very disconnected. Before, she had worked alone on the solo career of a Lyoko Warrior, but now, when there was the group of Lyoko Warriors with her, a group she did not belong to, she felt quite lonely.

"The tower is guarded by three Mantas and five Creepers. Prepare yourselves, they're coming to the corridor!" Jeremy warned.

"Okay, Jeremy!" William said, unsure. He had never seen a Manta when he had been himself, so he did not know what to expect.

The Mantas released their mines into the corridor in an enormous rain. Mary, Odd and Aelita fought against their numbers.

"Jeremy, I need more laser arrows!" Odd shouted.

"Coming!" Jeremy answered. Odd, who was in the front of the group, was devirtualized in an explosion of three mines and the new laser arrows were wasted.

"We can't get through!" Aelita shouted.

"Don't these mines ever run out?!" Mary roared, jumped forward and turned into a dragon, blocking the whole corridor. The first mines made her scales chip but the rest of them were engulfed in a fire burst. Mary started to proceed slowly, dropping broken pieces of the walls behind her.

"Remind me that I'll never get on her bad side," William said to Ulrich.

"That sight should be enough," Ulrich noted, amazed by the sight himself.

Mary stopped to catch a breath and the mines bombed her again. She knew that her scales could not last much longer at this rate, so she dashed forward with all her strength, letting a new burst of fire out of her jaws. The monsters were roasted with the mines and Mary squashed herself through the corridor to look at her accomplishment.

"You destroyed the party!" Yumi exclaimed, astonished by what she saw. The walls and the floor and a big part of the tower's room's floor were blackened. Mary snorted smoke puffs out of her nostrils and looked at the damage of her scales while Aelita went to the tower, which was no longer floating in the air but on the ground as steadily as the towers of the surface sectors. _It'll take a long time to get this damage fixed_ , Mary thought and let a snort out of her nostrils without smoke. The others jumped; they were not used to the big, green dragon who had announced to fight even as their shadow. Although, now she created a shadow over them, not the other way around.

"Tower deactivated," Aelita sighed.

"I'll bring you back. All of you," Jeremy announced.

Had Mary been in her human form, she would have asked if she would be materialized as well. However, she did nothing like that, scratching the loose scales off with her claws instead. Under them, new scales grew, but they were too soft and feeble to protect her; to boot, any damage to them would lead them to be defective when they would harden. They would have to be torn off in that case so that new ones could slowly grow to their place.

William looked at the dragon girl, cautious, and noticed a long scar on her right shoulder. It looked quite bad with the scales sticking out around it.

"I'm starting materialization! Materialize Aelita, materialize Ulrich, materialize Yumi!" Jeremy announced and executed the very familiar commands. Three Lyoko Warriors turned into pixels and disappeared from Lyoko, appearing into the scanners. Mary sat down at the blackened floor and closed her eyes, snivelling.

"Mary and William, I'll start to materialize you," Jeremy announced. Mary opened her eyes, surprised, scratched the final loose scales off and returned to her human form. William noticed that the upper part of her outfit had peculiar detritions now.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	6. Part 6: An Unpleasant Surprise

That was when the elevator doors opened. In the elevator were Jim, the principal Delmas and the William clone whose face still had the faint image of X.A.N.A.'s mark. The attack had targeted it and now it had brought school staff there. But why did it still work? The attack had been stopped!

"What are you doing here?" Jim asked with a bizarre voice. No one answered but everyone noticed that he and Delmas had the remnants of X.A.N.A.'s mark. The AI wanted to control how bad a situation they would end up into. Ulrich spotted a peculiar green mark on the cheeks of all three; was this some kind of a virus created by X.A.N.A. which was just weakening and had not lost its power after the attack had stopped?

"Well, two hours of detention to the whole group anyway!" Jim continued, not waiting for explanations.

"But Jim..." Odd started.

"Four hours of detention and if someone still complains, I'll make sure you will get eight hours of detention! Now get out of here!" Jim interrupted. Delmas said nothing.

They all left and after getting to school, Jim and Delmas remembered only that they had given detention to the group. The virus had done its job and X.A.N.A. no longer had to hold onto it after the attack. When it came to the detention of the Lyoko Warriors, they would do it later.

Mary and William had been silent during the time Jim and principal Delmas had been present. Soon after their departure Mary sighed, "What a mess this became! Let's get going before X.A.N.A. springs a trap."

"Sure," William answered, still unknowing of which part of his life Mary belonged to.

They left back to the Arena, called the Transporter and left Sector Five. On the decision of the Transporter, they ended up to the Mountain Sector.

"There should be a tower here nearby," Mary said quietly, half to herself.

"Well, lead the way, because I don't know this area," William noted, shrugging. Mary looked at him and asked, "I take it you won't mind taking a small scenic route if we go to a wrong direction?"

William shook his head as an answer and followed Mary as the girl started to go forward on the path.

It did not take much time before they were already in a tower. William could no longer stop himself from asking, "Mary, do we know each other?"

"You don't remember?" Mary asked, astounded. William shook head.

"I somehow know that I know you, but I can't connect you to anything," he told.

"Well, it's been some years," Mary said, feeling disappointed despite of her reasoning. "We were friends when we were kids. Remember now?"

William pondered hard for a moment. Then the memories returned from the depths of his memory.

"I thought that I'd never see you again!" he sighed when the memory of Mary's disappearance returned to his mind.

"If you don't stop going to Lyoko and neither of us dies, you'll see me quite often from now on!" Mary said and laughed, exhilarated. She felt good knowing that her childhood friend remembered her after all.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	7. Part 7:The Questions & The Harsh Answers

They talked for a while. Mary asked about those of her close relatives whom William knew only to find out that they, too, had disappeared in strange circumstances. In addition to that, Mary's mother had died relatively soon after Mary's disappearance. William, on the other hand, asked about Mary's life on Lyoko, about which Mary gave a general view: ten years on Lyoko, first under X.A.N.A.'s tutelage and later on her own as a Lyoko Warrior seceded from the AI's territory.

"It must've been hard," William said quietly.

"Well, it was. But I've gotten used to it," Mary noted. "I've had to."

She said it as if it was an easy thing. But it was not. Partially she missed her family and wanted it back even though she knew that she could not go back anymore. Not even when X.A.N.A. would be gone again.

Both teenagers sank to their thoughts when time crawled on and the talking points ran out. When Jeremy contacted them, Mary heard his voice distantly from behind her thoughts. The girl forced herself to return to the present and listened.

"Is everything all right?" Jeremy asked.

"Yeah, I guess," William answered and looked at the still rather distant Mary.

"Good, because I have found a way to get you out of Lyoko. It didn't work on the normal materialization program earlier, but I managed to configure the things right. But Mary, I have slightly bad news to you. At some point, you have gotten a virus from X.A.N.A. and it prevents your materialization," Jeremy told.

"Slightly? _Slightly?!_ What do you mean, 'slightly' bad news?!" Mary asked with a tense voice. The thought of carrying a virus made by X.A.N.A. gave her the creeps. What did it even do and how had she gotten it?

"I can go around it enough to materialize you, but you will keep your Lyoko powers on Earth until we find an antivirus. That's why you'll be dependent on Lyoko's existence, so supercomputer mustn't be shut down or you'll die," Jeremy told with a downright frighteningly calm voice. He had gotten used to this back when Aelita's life had depended on the supercomputer. That case had been experienced and this one would go with previously acquired knowledge, lessons from mistakes learned.

"Okay, when can the materialization be done?" Mary asked.

"In principle, now, but there's not enough power. It should work out tomorrow, though," Jeremy answered.

"Okay, we'll wait until then," William said. After that, Jeremy left the factory to return to school.

Mary sank back to her thoughts. _How on earth could I have gotten a virus? How can that antivirus be found? Or will it be found? Do we have to keep the supercomputer on all the time even if the fight against X.A.N.A. would be over?_ she worried. The things already felt horribly complicated, but in reality, it was all in the beginning.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


	8. Part 8: Safe

Mary was in a tower, pondering what was going on.

"Where am I?" she asked herself. Only herself because she saw no one in the tower.

"You are in a virtual world named Lyoko. You cannot get out of here because you are alone and no one can free you. I cannot do it myself," someone answered. Mary cried out, got up and looked around herself, frightened, without seeing anyone.

"Wh-who are you?" Where are you?" she asked.

"I am X.A.N.A. I am a multi-agent program which Franz Hopper created. I am here on Lyoko, but I am not strong enough to restore you. I get stronger over time and thus Return to the Past strengthens me. But no one is there to launch it anymore because Hopper virtualized himself with his daughter Aelita a couple of days ago and no one else can launch it," X.A.N.A. answered. Mary did not understand much of X.A.N.A.'s talk but something she did understand.

"You really can't do it yourself?" Mary asked.

"No," X.A.N.A. answered.

Now, ten years have passed since the previous conversation. Mary had not thought about it since then until the night she heard that she would get back to Earth during the following day. X.A.N.A. tried to stop that attempt by any means available, now with a virus. Jeremy was smarter and could go around it, but still Mary felt unsafe, for a virus even as a thought did not please her. During the night, she started to gradually get nervous but tried to calm down by thinking that if X.A.N.A. possessed someone, she would have her own Lyoko powers and weapons even on Earth against that Xanafied person. _It'll be fine if I can control them as well as on Lyoko..._

Soon the morning came and everyone got ready for materializing Mary and William. William was slightly nervous as well because he did not feel like facing a new series of jeers which might wait for him at school after the clone had replaced him for the last two months. Soon Jeremy contacted them and told them what to do. William went outside the tower and Jeremy materialized him; the computer genius had managed to link the boy's human DNA sequence code back to its place during the night. This materialization was slower than the usual ones, but Jeremy believed it to speed up back to normal after this as the supercomputer would not have to calculate the materialization first to make sure that nothing would happen to the materialized person due to the change.

Mary went to the center of the tower, rather restless. _What if this goes wrong? Anything could happen!_ she worried. After William had returned to the scanner safe and sound, Jeremy executed another old program, one which had been left unused, "Code: Earth!"

Then the blond boy went to the scanner room to wait for Mary's arrival with the others. The scanner opened up and Mary appeared. She looked at her old clothes which had been stretched badly as her body had aged inside the supercomputer. Once they had been comfortable, but now they were vexingly tight. The group took the needed things from the stash so that it would look like Mary had just come to the school. Yumi lent Mary her hoodie and a skirt she never used so that she could hide her old clothes. After getting to her room, Mary could change her old clothes to the new ones Odd and Aelita had gotten from a flea market on the previous day. In order to make the things go faster at Kadic, Jeremy had dealt with the necessary arrangements to get the girl there already.

Of course, Mary was nervous; after all, she had never been to school. Aelita did her best to help her get on with it, knowing from experience how she felt. She hoped that her fellow would be able to avoid the pitfalls she had fallen to back in the day.

As she got to the lessons right away, Mary joined an unknown crowd – a completely foreign concept to her – keeping Yumi and William an arm's length away at most. She knew what to do: she would follow her fellows' example and learn from that how to blend into the crowd.

Unfortunately, all this floundered when just before the first lesson Yumi remembered that they would have a mathematics test at first.

"Oh no! I haven't studied!" William cried out.

"When would you have had the time? You were on Lyoko for almost a month and most of it under X.A.N.A.'s possession!" Mary remarked. "What do I do? I've never studied anything!"

"I'm sure it'll go well," Yumi reassured her fellows. She had not read well to the test, but she believed she would do fine.

"Easy for you to say when you've been on the lessons," William sighed. Mary nodded. They both went to the lesson with Yumi, wishing that they could launch Return to the Past from that very place and moment to get a moment of studying time. William did consider skipping the class, but as he stepped into the classroom he already knew that it would not help.

Fortunately for everyone, the test was very short, and no one did it for longer than half an hour. The teacher checked the tests right away and everyone knew their grades before leaving the classroom.

After the lesson, Odd, having heard of the test, asked, which grade everyone had gotten.

"I got 8+," Yumi told, quite satisfied.

"7-. I thought I'd flunk!" William answered. When it was Mary's turn to answer, Jeremy's laptop beeped at a very favorable time. Jeremy exclaimed from behind the screen, "An active tower in the Forest Sector!"

They left to the factory and from there to Lyoko. This time, there were Hornets at the tower. The Lyoko Warriors attacked, and everyone took hits, but only William got devirtualized. Aelita went to the tower, entered the Code Lyoko and deactivated the tower. Mission accomplished.

"Hey Mary, which grade did you get?" Odd questioned in the scanner room. "X.A.N.A. attacked before you got to answer!"

"9. The topic was one I've learned on Lyoko," Mary noted. Only William truly knew something about her time on Lyoko and she had asked him to keep his knowledge as a secret. She trusted her friend's word.

Everything was fine and gradually Mary started to adjust into the double life as a student at Kadic and a Lyoko Warrior. No one could suspect, let alone imagine, that she had never been to school before or that she carried powers from another world. She looked just as normal as Aelita, who was a decade older than them all, William, who had been possessed by an AI, and the other Lyoko Warriors, none of whom had been a normal youngster ever since the first time they had stepped on Lyoko. While she had been shocked to find out that her sense of time had failed with nearly two and a half years – making her already 17 years old instead of just barely 15 years – she decided to get on with it and act like she had never thought otherwise.

But X.A.N.A. was not planning to give up. Fortunately to the world, the same applied to the group of Lyoko Warriors which was now two warriors stronger.

After seeing the AI's destruction, Mary saw with her mind's eye a world without danger, a world which they had had for a short while. That was a world without X.A.N.A., and someday they would get it back. She wanted to be sure about that.

Now she was a full-blood Lyoko Warrior now and she knew her mission.

 **/Code Lyoko (c) Moonscoop, Lyokostar story series and its original characters (c) Me/**


End file.
